Uproot | University of California - Berkeley

STATEMENT:

Wilderness evokes the feeling, in many of us, of a place that is beyond human control: uninhabited, isolated, and powerful. This pure idea of nature has often played the muse for designed landscapes, but being constrained by scale, these parodies are really exaggerated constructions of the human imagination. They are idealized hybrids that hide both their constructed nature and natural processes beneath a beautiful surface. In our design, the intention is to render the hand of the designer self-evident from without, while synthesizing and exaggerating the form of nature from within. The visitor is immersed within the bowl of hyper-nature, yet the landscape arises modestly from a grid of poles. We intend to create a dual experience whereby the landscape must be entered to be understood.